If you're telling others how to consume and enjoy content you are wrong.
Why can't R2 speak English?
- Thread starter Mr. Laser Beam
- Start date
Man this post reeks of arrogance
Let people enjoy the fandom in whatever way they want. It's not up to you to decide how they embrace it.
Maybe almost all of the circuits in R2 units are devoted to astromech functions, such as logic and problem solving, and there isn't any room left for protocol droid translation functions (without upgrades that aren't default for that droid series). Like, R2 can outthink 3PO, but 3PO can speak more languages.
We actually don't know (AFAIK) how many languages R2 can understand. It might be a tiny fraction of 3PO's six million.
We actually don't know (AFAIK) how many languages R2 can understand. It might be a tiny fraction of 3PO's six million.
Honestly, that's exactly what it is. They are not meant to be interacting with people all that much. In Episode 1 there is damage to the ship and the droids go out to fix it. That's their role. The way Luke treats R2, Anakin treats R2 and Poe and Rey treat BB-8 is completely different than most people. As once person I know put it, "He's talking to the toaster again."
Wow, talk about arrogant....
You guys know that the phrase "you're doing it wrong" is a silly, common internet catchphrase and not mean to be taken overly literally.
You want to obsess about Star Wars and take a deep dive into the lore, analyzing and examining every scrap of info you can find and speculating on how it's all supposed to work?
have at it. I'm definitely not telling you not to enjoy your fandom. Go for it.
however, if you should start bumping up into things that don't quite make sense or don't pass rigorous analysis, there's a reason for that. The universe is not meant to make sense on a microscopic level. It's a fantasy world which puts its focus on themes and character, not on the minutiae of world-buildling. EU writers who came up with "explanations" about Kessel Run parsecs are just being dumb. Arguing about why R2 doesn't speak English may be fun, but you have to at least acknowledge that the actual reason the character doesn't speak English is simply because its cuter that way.
Well, I'm sure that's among the actual reasons why R2 didn't speak English in the original film, but was it the only important reason? That's debatable, and I doubt it was.
Thematically, the original film was (at least in part) about over-reliance on technology. That was illustrated most crucially by the weakness in the Death Star and in its destruction. But also R2 was a symbol of technology, and one that Luke had to become deprived of in his trench run in order to illustrate the thematic point of over-reliance. Having R2's communication be indecipherable represents a gulf between people and technology, and hence it complements the thematic point of over-reliance on technology.
Furthermore, R2's indecipherability illustrates being baffled by technology, something with which the audience was familiar with, both then and now. That serves multiple functions, including underscoring to the audience right off the bat that this is a totally different world, as well pointing to bafflement and bewilderment as one of the sources of the problems that people have with technology. That latter aspect was voiced by 3PO: "Even I can't understand their logic at times."
Underscoring the alien galaxy aspect was also done with the Jawas and with Chewie. Cute, yes, but underscoring the alien-ness, yes, also.
Great post.
I think we see this here a lot because the people on here are coming from Star Trek, where every thing is scientifically explained down to the tiniest detail, so they go in expecting Star Wars to be that kind of sci-fi, since there are robots, aliens, and starships. There were few time I started to go in that direction, but then once I realized that it's space fantasy, and not sci-fi, I understood that they aren't going to approach things as scientifically as stuff like Star Trek does.
The Original Script For 'Star Wars' Reveals That R2-D2 Had English Dialogue
https://vocal.media/futurism/the-or...-HFugKximz-CkeVFRhjdry-N_TF-3cACCZceeu9DPAWeA
https://vocal.media/futurism/the-or...-HFugKximz-CkeVFRhjdry-N_TF-3cACCZceeu9DPAWeA
"Original script" is a bit of a misnomer in this case. It was just one of several major drafts Lucas made while trying to figure out what the movie would be. As such they vary quite wildly as he wasn't developing the story as much as the world, and trying to figure out what kind of story it could fit into along the way. So yeah, at one point R2 had lines. At one point, the McGuffin was going to be Obi-Wan's kyber crystal amulet. At one point Luke was a girl. Pretty much every element was in flux right up until shooting.
Obviously...
What? Who was trying to do a marketing ploy in 1976? Lucas was focused on making a movie and nobody had the foggiest idea about the marketing fallout from Star Wars. R2 and 3PO were in the movie regardless if R2 could speak or not. It's not like Lucas got paid more for 2 droids vs. 1.
Had R2 spoke or not seems to have no bearing on whether 3PO was in the movie. Toy sales would have stayed the same.
In-universe reason.
Some people seem to basically understand Droidspeak. Or at least the basics of it enough to get what the droid is saying, if not the details. It is also possible that some droids are given moderately more Basic sounding Droidspeak that is more easily understandable by people that are around a particular model of droid long enough (in the cases of Chopper and BB-8, and R2 unit with slightly less people). Anakin seemed to understand R2-D2 just fine, and Luke seemed to at least partly understand the droid after a few years.
R2 had dialogue in the comic Dark Horse did based on one of Lucas's earlier versions of A New Hope.
Which is what Star Wars was.
https://metro.co.uk/2016/04/25/geor...ar-wars-film-series-is-told-by-r2-d2-5839586/
Yeah, one of Lucas's earliest ideas was to steal borrow the idea from Kurosawa's 'The Hidden Fortress' of having a pair of lowly peasant characters being the window into these much grander events that unfolded around them. IIRC in the rough draft (or the treatment? I can never keep it straight what changed when) they were a pair of bickering Imperial bureaucrats. Wasn't until later he made them droids as an analogy to the very lowest rung of society.
In interviews and the like he'd often mention how the whole saga is being told from a future perspective mostly transcribed from the accounts of R2 himself. A thread he sort of continued though the ST, but was rather spoiled (surprise, surprise) by the ST's tendency to side-line and underuse R2. Oh well.
In interviews and the like he'd often mention how the whole saga is being told from a future perspective mostly transcribed from the accounts of R2 himself. A thread he sort of continued though the ST, but was rather spoiled (surprise, surprise) by the ST's tendency to side-line and underuse R2. Oh well.
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